Action-based, relaxing games?

[Gamerforlife]

-Donkey Kong Country 1

I don't think you've played the same Donkey Kong Country that I've played. Maybe the first few levels are relaxing, but the game gets sadistic fast.

Oh come on, the original DKC is easy as pie. DKC Returns is more fitting of your description.

The Ratchet and Clank games are the best suggestion I've seen so far in this thread. They are chock full of intense firefights. However, the game weighs so many things in your advantage that they never feel particularly hard. Some of your weapons are overpowered. Plus, you character and weapons are constantly improving. Even when you die you keep your experience points. Ratchet and Clank Tools of the Destruction in the best entry for your purposes. In the unlikely event that any fight feels too hard, you can just drop a disco item and laugh as your enemies (including BOSSES!) are forced to start dancing hilariously as you fill them full of lead.

My suggestions:

Okami - Fights are fun and fairly easy
Beyond Good and Evil - Simple, intuitive combat controls make for fluid, elegant and simple fights
Prince of Persia Sands of Time - Same as above
Lord of the Rings: Return of the King - Though some parts can be tough, this is a game where mashing triangle makes you parry ALL attacks. Plus, bane moves just DESTROY your enemies. Lastly, the more you level up the more powerful you become, so just replay some levels for more experience points.
Mortal Kombat Shaolin Monks - Fairly simple beat 'em up, especially with two players
The Sly Cooper games - Way better than that Jak and Daxter crap, in my opinion anyway
Dust: An Elysian Tale - Pour all your experience points into magic and abuse Dust Storm and watch your combos go through the roof
Batman Arkham Asylum and Arkham City - If you can master countering and/or vaulting over your enemies, combat is a breeze. Unless you hit the challenge rooms, but they are optional and the ones in Arkham City are fairly easy.
Sleeping Dogs - Even simpler than the Batman games, just get used to hitting the counter button when an enemy is glowing and fights are a breeze
Marvel Ultimate Alliance 1 & 2 or the X-Men Legend games - Simple arcade inspired action rpgs where you have four characters (essentially four lives) who all get stronger as you level them up. Eventually certain characters get strong enough to break the game.
X-Men Origins Wolverine - Wolvie is pretty overpowered in this game, as he damn well should be! He's freaking Wolverine!
The Darkness II - You're an overpowered, supernaturally powered killing machine! Comic book games are pretty good choices for the purpose of this thread
The Lego games - There's a lot of them, but the Lego Batman games are a good choice
Sonic Generations
Gauntlet Dark Legacy

Someone mentioned Dynasty Warriors, try DW 5.

Old school

Streets of Rage 2 - I think one of the reasons it's so popular is because it is one of the easiest beat 'em ups ever made, up until the last two or three stages. But by then you have tons of extra lives.

[Gamerforlife]

And I wouldn't recommend Fez, the puzzles will infuriate you, ESPECIALLY if you are going for 100% game completion. I consider myself pretty good at puzzles games for the most part, and I gave up on it

[Jrecee]

Nights

[lisalover1]

The Sly Cooper games - Way better than that Jak and Daxter crap, in my opinion anyway

...Unless you're talking about Jak 2, in which I completely agree. But NO ONE badmouths the first game when I'm around!

[BoneSnapDeez]

Super Mario World
Secret of Mana
Secret of Evermore

[ninjainspandex]

Far cry 3 i just found exploring the island so damn relaxing

[Gamerforlife]

The Sly Cooper games - Way better than that Jak and Daxter crap, in my opinion anyway

...Unless you're talking about Jak 2, in which I completely agree. But NO ONE badmouths the first game when I'm around!

I'll give you that the first one was good, though completely unoriginal. It was all downhill from there though as the series pretty much sold out and tried to copy Grand Theft Auto, which is what Naughty Dog does best these days, copy other popular games. Sly Cooper and Ratchet & Clank were better series IMO. Naughty Dog's last great platform game was Crash Bandicoot Warped.

[lisalover1]

The Sly Cooper games - Way better than that Jak and Daxter crap, in my opinion anyway

...Unless you're talking about Jak 2, in which I completely agree. But NO ONE badmouths the first game when I'm around!

Sly Cooper and Ratchet & Clank were better series IMO.

Have you played the original R&C lately? In my opinion, it's about as cookie-cutter as a 3rd-person shooter (nevermind that it incidentally has some platforming) that I've seen in a long while. Not to mention that it's embarrassingly easy, and that Ratchet comes off as one of the most annoying main characters in the genre in that era. It isn't bad, it's just mind-numbingly boring.

[BurningDoom]

-Donkey Kong Country 1

I don't think you've played the same Donkey Kong Country that I've played. Maybe the first few levels are relaxing, but the game gets sadistic fast.

Oh come on, the original DKC is easy as pie. DKC Returns is more fitting of your description.

The last map or 2 are pretty difficult in the original DKC.

[Gamerforlife]

Have you played the original R&C lately? In my opinion, it's about as cookie-cutter as a 3rd-person shooter (nevermind that it incidentally has some platforming) that I've seen in a long while. Not to mention that it's embarrassingly easy, and that Ratchet comes off as one of the most annoying main characters in the genre in that era. It isn't bad, it's just mind-numbingly boring.

R&C had quite a bit of platforming actually, and the weapons were pretty original for the time. You could already see in that first game how brilliant the weaponry would become in that series. It also mixed shooting and platforming better than Jak 2 did and better than any other game since. R&C may be easy, but so was the original Jak and Daxter. Jak 2 was frustrating as hell, and I'd rather play any easy R&C game than the rage inducing Jak 2.

I don't know why people think Ratchet was annoying in R&C. Clank stupidly led them into a trap, and never apologized for that. That's why Ratchet gave him so much attitude throughout the rest of the game. Pretty justified if you ask me. People so often forget about the facts when they decide to hate on a character. I find it odd that no one complains about what an idiot Clank was in the first game but I digress. Now if you want to argue that the humor and characters in the first R&C weren't great, you can argue that I guess even though I don't agree, but the R&C games to follow were certainly better than Jak & Daxter in those areas. They're still funny and entertaining even now. Daxter is one of the most obnoxious characters ever created

Course, Sly Cooper was the best, though probably least successful of those three big franchises in my opinion. It has the best characters and the best dialog and the best story. It also had the best graphics and character designs of the three series. There's just no beating that awesome cel shaded look. It also had a lot gameplay variety and was doing stylish platforming before Prince of Persia Sands of Time hit the scene and mixing stealth based gameplay into a platformer in brilliant ways.

That's how I feel about those three series. I'd rank them:

1. Sly Cooper series
2. Ratchet & Clank
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Distant third - Jak and Daxter series